The first time I experienced the power of manifestation was in my freshman year of high school. There was a story-writing contest sponsored by a civic organization in my town in suburban Chicago. It was open to thousands of entrants not only locally, but also in the surrounding towns. For an English class assignment, we had to submit stories for the contest.
I don’t even remember what my story was about. What I do remember is saying out loud, “I am going to win this.”
There was a cash prize involved, though I don’t recall whether it was $50 or $250. It was somewhere in that range. When I received the phone call that I had won, I was more surprised by the accuracy of my prediction than the fact that I had actually won.
Nonetheless, I tucked this little experience away for many years, not realizing that it was a valuable lesson. Not a lesson in predicting future events, but in manifesting them.
It took reaching a very dark time in my life to make the connection. My spouse at the time, through a combination of physical and mental illness, drug use, bad choices, deceit, manipulation…I could go on…ruined our marriage and destroyed us financially.
On top of that, my dad suffered a heart attack and had triple-bypass surgery, and my grandmother died—all within a few months. Because of our financial ruin, I was unable to travel home and be with my family. My emotional state was so bad that a friend I had just met that year would give me an encouraging wake-up phone call every morning to make sure I got out of bed and forged ahead with life.
It was during this time that it seemed a lot of people were throwing the phrase, “everything happens for a reason” in my face. But what reason could there possibly be for this unfathomable scale of implosion? I hadn’t done anything to deserve the total wreckage of my life as I knew it. I realized that things don’t just happen for mysterious reasons; we make them happen through our actions, intents, and manifestations.
I’m not a religious person, and that’s trauma-fodder for an entirely different story, another time. However, I believe there is power in the interconnectedness of humanity. There have been studies showing the effectiveness of prayer—particularly group prayer—to bring positive results. I believe in this power, as I believe in everyone’s right to pray about it to whichever deity or deities they choose. I choose to believe that this power is more like a form of energy than an entity directing the course of events—an energy that we can influence. We can’t always keep bad and senseless things from happening, but we can try to create a positive influence in our own lives and encourage its growth through connections with others. Sometimes, through a combination of positive actions and positive prayer or mindfulness or meditation or manifestation, we can make good things happen.
Winning a silly story contest was just the trivial example I needed to understand how to apply this concept on a large scale. As a contrast to the dumpster fire lit by the manifestations of my ex, the simple act of claiming that victory both verbally and through my writing skill, was illuminating.
Enter Lyme disease. I’ve struggled with chronic health problems since being bitten by a tick in 1995. No doubt this has been a contributing factor to other negative life experiences. In fact, I sometimes wonder if my ex was also infected, and whether that was a factor in his mental-health issues. Regardless, there came a time about eight years ago when I discovered I could make a difference for the potentially millions of people suffering along with me.
Since then I’ve put my whole self into activism for Lyme disease victims. I’ve made some informative videos, one of which garnered tens of thousands of views within the first year or two. That was what propelled me (despite its long length and terrible production value—give me a little grace; I’d never done anything like that!) into a prominent role in the world of Lyme activism. I made a promise early-on, that I would not stop until there was justice for all of us suffering the atrocities of Lyme disease. I am manifesting that positive result.
By never stopping, always trying to find a way forward; seizing every opportunity to create positive energy around myself, my allies, and the cause; and by repeating the manifesto that there will be justice, we have propelled forward into a new phase of making things happen.
We are positioned to find legal remedies for the decades of abuses committed by the political power players within the Lyme disease construct. I remain fully committed to seeing this through, and I invite everyone to seize your power and help me manifest the outcome we all deserve. Whether by prayer, meditation, sending out positive vibes, demonstrating care for others through good works, I believe all of that energy can multiply and help bring about our vindication.
This is bigger than any one person. We need all of us to believe there is a good and just ending to this story. We are the authors of that destiny. We will write it and make it so, because people are dying, and we can’t wait for someone else to make it happen.
We are going to win this.